


Four Times Frederick Didn't Understand Why His Roommates Were So Weird About Music (And One Time He Proved He Was the Weirdest of All)

by LazyWriterGirl



Series: 629 Karys Avenue [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, All Hail Aversa del Rey, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Anna is the New Adele, Booty Shaking, Characters Singing Crybaby Music, Crybaby Music, F/F, F/M, Female My Unit - Raina, Frederick Being Frederick, Frederick Being Shameless, M/M, Multi, Not really a songfic, Raina Should Charge Admission, Robin Loves Candles As Much As Frederick Loves Fire, The Feather Duster, Twins, UNLEASH THE FRED BEAST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-07
Updated: 2016-10-07
Packaged: 2018-08-20 01:48:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8231884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LazyWriterGirl/pseuds/LazyWriterGirl
Summary: It begins with Anna, and everything goes downhill from there as Frederick skirts around the answer to a very important question: Why can't any of his housemates (his boyfriend included) listen to music like  normal  people?
What's the point in blasting it so loud you can barely hear yourself singing (poorly) along?





	

The first time it happened, Frederick hadn’t been having the greatest day.

 

As his feet hit the pavement leading into his neck of the neighbourhood, Frederick noted the rather conspicuous lack of any sort of vehicle sitting in the driveway. For a fairly modest townhouse occupied by five very busy young adults, 629 Karys Avenue had never looked quite so…deserted. Robin’s bicycle—a nice cyclocross model that Frederick himself had bought for the younger man a few years back—was missing in all its silver-blue, mud-splattered glory. Anna’s car, the most expensive of their odd family’s modes of transportation, was nowhere to be seen. The Grima siblings’ shared sedan was not stationed at its usual place.

In spite of himself Frederick felt the corners of his mouth turn up into a small smile. He knew how much Aversa, Raina, and his Robin loved their beat-up old junker with the awful purple interior—and the silver hood and trunk that stood out against the black body of the car—but honestly it was  _such_  an eyesore. It clashed terribly with Robin’s bike, and looked downright despicable next to Anna’s ostentatiously bright red imported Feroxi coupé.

Not that Frederick would ever say that.

A quick glance at his wristwatch left him feeling slightly confused as he stood staring at the empty driveway. Normally somebody would be home by now. Normally he would have  _somebody_  to talk to, to fill the sad spaces in his brain with friendly chatter.  _Oh well._  In a roundabout way, the silence that accompanied being the only person in the house would be good for him. He could stew over the morning’s conversation with his parents while preparing a stew—he laughed quietly at his wit—for his  _true_  family to enjoy whenever they got home—providing they did so at a reasonable hour where eating a hearty meal would not be detrimental to their sleeping patterns.

Just thinking about his parents made Frederick feel sore all over. Even after four years they hadn’t become accustomed to the idea of their son majoring in hospitality and hotel management. They said that it was an embarrassment to their family name (not that the family name had been worth anything before they’d worked their way up); that he was wasting his genetic inheritance, or perhaps he just wasn’t good enough to follow in his parents’ footsteps. After all,  _they_ had been the architects behind some of the city’s most important buildings, and so what did he think he was doing, learning how to cook? Their comments this morning had all been in that vein.

_“Come now, Frederick, don’t be childish.”_

_“We raised you to act a certain way, and this is most certainly not it.”_

And his favourite,  _“If all you want is to be a fry cook, you shouldn’t have been born into this family.”_

It wasn’t as if Frederick wasn’t  _intelligent_ —on the contrary, he was  _rather_  bright, thank you very much—but something about the world of cooking, the world of stewardship and hospitality had lured him in and refused to let him leave. Not that his father understood that, heavens no, and his  _mother_ , well…Frederick didn’t like to think about their disapproval too much. He turned his key, satisfied with the click of the lock, and stepped into his home as his thoughts turned towards dinner preparations.

There was a faint sound that must have been coming from the house beside them, so Frederick turned to lock the door, careful to make sure that he wouldn’t be attacked in his own home while cooking. Shoes were kicked off of his feet and arranged just-so on the rack before he headed into the living room, intent on checking the news quickly before getting changed.

Just as his hand touched the remote, Frederick froze.

The sounds he’d heard were loud now,  _very_  loud, and distinctly musical—a string of notes that he vaguely remembered hearing before. They were accompanied by a louder, less musical voice. Frederick jumped, practically feeling his body shoot straight upwards, but before he could call out and ask who was there the sounds picked up and the voice seemed to be spiralling directly into a desperate plea.

 

[“But I know I have a fickle heart and a bitterness](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDRwqTNLGDs)

And a wandering eye, and a heaviness in my head

But don’t you remember, don’t you remember?

The reason you loved me before

Baby please remember me once more”

 

That voice…was familiar. “Anna?” If she was home, that explained why all three vehicles were absent from the premises; Aversa would have taken Anna’s car, leaving her siblings to decide who got to drive to work. “Anna, is everything okay up there?”

 

Wait. If things had worked out the way he was almost sure they had, then that would mean Robin had been made to take his bike to school. He would certainly be upset about having to ride through the mess of leaves their neighbours didn’t seem to be in a rush to clean up, and he’d certainly be tired and sore all over, as well. Well, Frederick knew of a few ways to ease his boyfriend’s sore muscles…

 

There was a sound much like something falling to the floor and Frederick winced. “Shit! Thought I drank all that!” From the sounds of it Anna had dropped something that would require a few hours with his handy carpet steamer, and while he had no issue lending it to her, he also didn’t know precisely where it was at the moment. “Fuck…Freddy, that’s you, right?”

Sighing, Frederick climbed the stairs, walking the familiar path to Anna and Aversa’s shared room. He pushed on the half-open door with some displeasure, only to note that the volume of Anna’s music had gone from dangerously high to barely audible. “What were you doing?”

“Singing,” Anna said nonchalantly, stepping directly into a growing spot on the ground. It looked like wine. The redhead plastered on the large grin she usually wore in these situations and attempted to hide the worst of the stain under her sock-clad feet, not doing herself or the carpet any favours. “Whaddaya think? Think I should join the campus talent show?”

“I think that you will be spending a good few hours with some Mr. Clean and a toothbrush,” he said, nodding at the stain under Anna’s feet. “And please, for all our sakes,  _don’t_  do that. People are aware of our living situation, and your poor performance might do us all a great deal of social injustice.”

“You are  _so_  rude!”

“And  _you_ are acting very strangely. Is there any particular reason for you to be belting out Adele songs at the very top of your lungs? While drinking?” A thought struck him swiftly, and he asked, as gently as he could, “Did something happen between you and Aversa?”

“No! Gods! I mean I  _miss_  her, obviously, because she’s off trying to get funding for the next most important discovery since Atlantis, but we’re  _fine._  Sometimes people just like to sing along to their music, Frederick! Don’t you ever just burst into song? Like, because it makes you feel better?”

And with that the redhead turned away from him, cranking the volume up until it was so loud that Frederick had to leave the room—and shut the door behind him—for fear of losing all sense of hearing. The sounds of a piano reverberated through the very floor, accompanied by Anna’s voice starting up about “when we were young”, and Frederick had to stifle a small smile. Anna was certainly loud…and a lot stranger than he’d initially thought…but at least, even without knowing, she had lifted his mood.

 

 

 

After changing out of his school clothes, Frederick made sure to stick construction-worker earplugs into his ears before coming up from the basement to start on dinner.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

 

The second time it happened, Frederick had been taken aback and, if he was honest, rather freaked out.

Aversa’s irregular travel schedules meant that she was the only member of the household without a strict chore schedule. Due to the nature of her work, it was only fair that she wouldn’t be expected to have as regular of a routine, and that had always suited Frederick just fine. Sure, she was just as insane as Robin and Raina, having been raised in the same home, but theirs was a level of insanity with which Frederick felt confident he could cope.

Still, even Aversa, it seemed, had a weakness for what Anna had eventually explained to him as “personal musical therapy”. Frankly he didn’t understand it, not really, but if it worked he wouldn’t complain. Too much. Though it may have been in part due to his somewhat restrictive upbringing at the hands of his parents, Frederick couldn’t wrap his head around the idea that doing something so simple as singing along to sad music (poorly, in Anna’s case) could  _lift_  a mood, but he really wasn’t about to ask for more detail.

As it was, the whole thing with Anna had been a little stranger than he would have ever cared to admit, so he just left the thought alone. That being said, he hadn’t meant to walk in on Aversa’s version of musical emotional release, but it had happened that on the one day his least favourite professor decided to skip out on class altogether, she was, for whatever reason, at home.

Normally that wouldn’t have been a problem, and it honestly wouldn't have been…if he’d stayed downstairs.

He hadn’t even meant to be on the upper floor, that having been designated as the girls’ domain during the early days of their living together. It was just that his and Robin’s towels had just been cleaned, and of course he had to go upstairs to get them. Raina was on laundry duty permanently, as she had a strange love for the chore, and she always put all of the towels in the upstairs linen closet  _just_  so that her brother or Frederick would have to make the trip to get them. That was just the sort of small prank in which Raina regularly indulged.

It wasn’t as if walking up and down the stairs was difficult, of course, but said closet was right by Anna and Aversa’s room. Ever since a rather…unfortunate incident…this meant that a trip to get the towels usually resulted in some sort of comment or quip from one or both of the two women. Comments or quips of which neither Frederick nor Robin were entirely fond.

 

In any case, Frederick had found himself, on this particularly inauspicious day, trying to take all of the towels (four more than he normally did) to eliminate the need for a return trip. Predictably, the entire pile fell out of his hands, and as he’d sat on the floor trying to refold everything he’d heard the sounds of music coming from Anna and Aversa’s room. It was a song from a film based on a classic novel, and frankly Frederick would never have expected  _Aversa_ of all people to be into something like it.

She’d always struck him as a fan of tribal chants, or ethnomusicographer recordings of obscure folk songs and musical traditions.

Against his better judgement he had poked his head in through the doorway—it seemed to constantly be left ajar anyway, so really, where was the fault? He hadn’t been expecting to see what he saw, and the shock almost made him tear the towel in his lap in half.

Aversa stood in a gown—a legitimate gown, for goodness’s sake!—that looked like her usual gothic tribal attire, only even more  _out there_  and fancy. It was long and flowing and pitch black, but beaded and sequined in a way that he just couldn’t figure out, though it did look rather nice. The lights in the room were dimmed just enough for him to be able to see only her, and the curtains had been drawn tightly closed. A mini spotlight, the light coming from gods-only-knew-where, highlighted Aversa’s face. She turned on the spot as if she were a figurine in a music box. Aversa’s eyes were held half-closed as she spun, singing along to the music. In her hands she held a hairbrush as if it were a microphone.

 

[“Will you still love me when I'm no longer young and beautiful?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_1aF54DO60)  
Will you still love me when I've got nothing but my aching soul?  
I know you will, I know you will  
I know that you will  
Will you still love me when I'm no longer beautiful?”

 

Frederick didn’t know how to feel as Aversa clutched the hairbrush to her chest, singing into it with all her soul. All that he knew was that it was all far too intriguing for him to look away. On the one hand, she was a  _much_ better singer than Anna, or perhaps she simply only sang songs that suited her voice. Still, there was something inherently…weird about all of this.

Not just weird, but downright  _bizarre._

Who did this sort of thing? Who put on a fancy ball gown and set up a hidden spotlight just to spin around slowly while singing sad, pseudo-contemplative new-wave pop music? And not even for an audience! For herself, in a bedroom she shared with her girlfriend, with nobody for company save for Frederick, who was sure that she had simply assumed he wouldn’t come upstairs. Frederick honestly couldn’t help but stare, but even he wasn’t sure what he was focusing on so intently.

He hadn’t even noticed the sharp  _click_ of Aversa’s nails on her iPod as the music came to a halt.

“If you leave in the next ten seconds and  _never_ mention this to anyone, I won’t pick up the phone and call Lissa to tell her a certain  _hilarious_  feather-duster story I have yet to share with her, as per your requests. I won’t tell Robin that  _you_  were the one who dropped his favourite book into the pit at the bonfire party last year, and I won’t tell Raina about how you were  _intentionally_  clam-jamming her and that absolutely-fucking- _gorgeous_  PoliSci major all of last semester because you thought the girl looked ‘shifty’. I also won’t tell her how you  _also_  intentionally clam-jammed her last week when she brought home that hot guy she met at the bus stop.”

Frederick looked up into Aversa’s eyes—it cost him two seconds—before backing away and dragging all of his and Robin’s towels behind him; cleanliness be damned! He thought he heard Aversa’s laugh following him down the stairs, but when Frederick turned at the top of the basement steps he was alone. His heart fluttered about madly in his chest; Aversa was a dangerous woman to offend, and while they’d never been friendly this was the first time he’d ever seen her so murderous. Frederick heaved a sigh of relief before shaking himself back into a composed state.

 

That had been a very strange and unsettling moment, and it forced him to think back on Raina’s teasing in their early days of friendship.

 

“My big sister is a witch, you know, and she has great power over the minds of men. Better watch yourself around her, Fred. And no matter what you do,  _never_  make her angry. If she gives you the chance to get out before her anger truly unfolds, you’d better take it.”

Not that Frederick really believed in witches, but with all the foreign locales Aversa had visited, one could never be certain exactly what she could and could not do. That, and it wasn’t even the promise of supernatural vengeance that frightened him so much as the very obviously real threats she had decided to lay down before him. Still, he shook the thought from his head and went about his day.

 

 

 

He made sure not to mention  _anything_  when Anna, Robin and Raina came home; not even when Aversa made three, no,  _four_  feather-duster related jokes at the dinner table.

 

 

***

 

 

 

The third time it happened, Frederick began to seriously wonder why his roommates couldn’t just listen to their music in a more normal way, without dragging their personal issues into it or turning it into a circus sideshow (in the best way possible, of course).

In hindsight, Frederick should have known that Raina would be even more out there in her musical sessions than Anna and Aversa combined. While Anna had just been straight-up loud and Aversa had just been straight-up strange, Raina had a funny little mix of vibes coming off of her in waves at all times, and the addition of an instrumental background could surely do nothing but add to that.

It helped that the young woman’s entire life seemed to play out like a sitcom of sorts. Well, if there  _were_  any sitcoms about sexually adventurous, almost literally insane (in a good way) nursing students whose revolving door of sexual partners consisted of some of the most attractive people Frederick had ever seen in his life. Seriously, sometimes he wondered where she found half the people who’d shared her bed in the last two or three years.

Regardless, Frederick was a little more than somewhat-surprised to come home one evening to find Raina holding a real microphone and preparing to sing as a sad, sad melody backed her up. She caught his eye as he sat down and watched, and the look on her face said she didn’t want to talk about whatever had happened until it was done, so he simply nodded and closed his eyes, ready to listen. Raina was actually a good singer, which pleased Frederick’s ears if nothing else, but the lyrics were so pathetic that he almost wanted to grab the microphone away from her.

 

[“And I hate to say I love you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgAbOWxd2dM)

When it’s so hard for me.

And I hate to say I want you

When you make it so clear

You don’t want me.”

 

Frederick let the rest of the song wash over him, surprised that he could feel some sincerity in Raina’s tone. He wasn’t entirely sure if she was upset, or if Raina’s flair for the dramatic was what was lending itself to the authenticity in her performance. It was hard to tell with such a theatrical young woman, sometimes.

 

At least the song was nice.

 

About a minute later the music ended and a fanfare played as a score rolled up onto the screen, but Frederick turned his attention to the singer. He watched as Raina set the microphone on the coffee table and plopped onto the couch beside him, wiping her nose on a tissue she produced seemingly out of midair. More likely from out of her sleeve, but still.

“What’s wrong?”

“Remember that girl I got coffee with all the time? The girl who’s in, like, eighty percent of my classes?”

Frederick remembered seeing a girl walking around campus with Raina. A pretty girl with wild hair and intelligent eyes. “Weren’t you dating her?”

“No! I never even slept with her!” Raina crossed her arms. “She told me today that her  _girlfriend_  is getting jealous of all the time we spend together, and that she ‘diffused the situation’ by telling the jealous harpy that I’m ‘great’ but she ‘doesn’t like me that way’. What even  _is_  that?”

Frederick didn’t want to say anything, but it seemed reasonable enough. If she wasn’t sleeping with someone, Raina was attempting to sleep with someone—all while being a responsible, model nursing student, of course. As was typical of Raina’s attempted conquests, however, the longer it took, the lower her chances of eventually getting her target into bed. The rest of the house had a running pool going on, though lately things had been a bit quiet.

“I’m sorry, Raina. You must have really liked this girl.”

“Well I mean, yeah. But also like…I  _completely_ embarrassed myself for her this morning. Like, sang-to-her-in-front-of-a-crowd-but-got-a-“Aww, you’re such a sweet friend”-in-response level of embarrassed!”

He didn’t quite know what to say to that. “Surely she was genuine about it, at least? You’re a very good singer.”

Raina’s response was to flick a few strands of pale hair out of her eyes before punching him—and not lightly—in the shoulder. “Aww, what would _you_  know Freddy-bear?” She laughed as he began to rub the spot that would  _surely_  bruise a little before saying, “But no, like, I was  _crushed_ that she didn’t care. I mean, I know she has a girlfriend but like,  _I’m_  a hot piece of ass with a beautiful brain and bedside manner and a killer voice and  _look at me_!”

Frederick looked. While Raina was no Robin, she was certainly attractive; and, though slightly self-aggrandizing, truly in possession of all the aforementioned traits. Still, a girlfriend was a girlfriend, and this whole situation was the kind of ridiculously straightforward get-over-it scenario that Frederick always seemed to have to point out to the various people in his life.

“Well Raina, you can’t win them all, no matter how obvious it seems to be that you should.” That was weirdly phrased, he thought, but Raina seemed to get the point as she threw her arms around him in a loose hug. Her phone beeped once, then twice, and after she’d checked it her smile only grew about two sizes too large.

“Thanks!” she chirped, though her eyes were on the phone in her hands, “I feel much better.”

“Anything for you, Doc Grima.”

The cheeky nickname earned him another shoulder injury for his troubles, and Raina’s eyes narrowed slightly. “That’s  _Nurse_  Grima, Freddy, don’t be a shit.” Raina’s phone beeped once again and she typed out a quick response, eyes returning to normal. “Now, how about we sing a little bit, in celebration?”

He shrugged. There were worse things that he could be listening to. “Sure.”

Raina ignored him, already punching a number into the karaoke machine that he wasn’t even certain they’d had before today. A familiar piano melody began to play, and he looked up at her questioningly. Her back was already turned, grip tight on the microphone, head bobbing in time to the music.

 

[“You and me, we made a vow](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCkpzqqog4k)

For better or for worse

I can’t believe you let me down

But the proof’s in the way it hurts.”

 

Frederick cleared his throat, kicking the back of Raina’s leg when that failed to get her attention. She turned around, frowning deeply at the interruption. “What? I’m singing here!”

“I thought you said we were celebrating?”

She looked at him with her best “Don’t be stupid, Frederick” expression before shaking her head almost roughly. “Yeah, and this is one of my faves, so shhh!”

 

“You say I’m crazy

‘Cause you don’t think I know what you’ve done

But when you call me baby

I know I’m not the only one.”

 

Frederick stared at his boyfriend’s twin sister, slack-jawed for a moment. Were he and Robin the only sane members of the household? It would explain so much. If this was Raina’s idea of celebratory music, it said a lot about Robin’s obsession with the many varied areas of study within psychology. Any concerned sibling would want to figure this business out.

Still, Raina  _was_  a truly good singer. Good enough to make some sort of living out of it if she so wanted, though he knew that her heart was set on its noble path already.

Frederick spent the rest of the afternoon watching his boyfriend’s sister sing sad ballad after sad ballad. It didn’t even appear to him, not for a minute, that Raina  _knew_  any songs that weren’t whiny, or sad, or pining, or upsetting in some context. Needless to say it was a rather interesting, entertaining—if absolutely  _bizarre_ —concert.

 

 

 

The young man that appeared at the door with flowers and a stupidly charming, besotted smile on his face seemed to think so too, after Frederick had (reluctantly) allowed him to come in.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

The fourth time it happened, Frederick was legitimately upset at the discovery of yet another housemate using music to undergo a bout of Anna’s coveted “personal musical therapy”. After all, to think that Robin,  _his Robin_ , could become so upset that he would trap himself in the basement, alone and surrounded by literally at least ten scented candles, almost stomach-deep in a pile of chocolate, and singing along to overly-indulgent cry-baby music was…inconceivable.

 

And yet that was how Frederick found his boyfriend one cloudy afternoon.

 

He had walked into the house to find, as per usual, Anna and Aversa making out on the couch. A loud, obnoxiously sexy beat interrupted him twice before he managed to make himself heard. Frederick had tried, numerous times, to remind them that the living room was neutral ground, but as Anna had so  _helpfully_  pointed out each and every time, “I bought the couch, right? So,” and she always made it a point to drag out the “o” sound for as long as possible before continuing, “if I want to make out with my perfect, stunning, constantly-absent girlfriend on this couch, I am  _well_  within my rights.”

He gave up on the idea of continuing the argument right there and made for the basement steps, only for Aversa to detach herself from Anna`s neck long enough to call out, “Not sure you want to go down there, Freddy-bear.”

 

Had he heeded her warning, he would have been spared one of the strangest experiences of his life.

 

The first thing he noticed was that it was darker than normal, though from the barrage of scents that almost bowled him over as he walked further down the stairs, he could guess as to why. Robin had never been picky about which candles he had lit at any given time, and so some days the combination of smells was downright offensive. Frederick himself had passed out once after smelling a god-awful mix of bath soap, lavender, and bacon for too long.

Thankfully, he could not detect the bacon candle among today’s players in the candle game, and so he resolved to keep his mouth shut. For now.

Standing right outside of the door separating their living space from the shared laundry area Frederick didn’t know what Robin thought he sounded like in that moment, but it was…decidedly not very good. While not quite as bad as what Anna called “singing”, Robin was not at all the talented one of the three Grima siblings, and proof of that rang in Frederick’s ears the closer he came to the source of the…sound. Not that the brown-haired man could really fault his boyfriend, though; not very many young men Frederick knew could handle the songs of Mariah Carey. If anything, Robin deserved points for effort as he belted out as best he could in time to Mariah’s impressive vocals.

 

[“Maybe you could be mine again](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XrebBVL1KU)

Maybe we could make that dream for real

Like way back then

When love was yours and mine

Maybe we could bring it back to life.”

 

Frederick hadn’t meant to interrupt, not really, but  _what had he done_  to upset Robin so much? And why hadn’t the other man said anything? “Robin? Robin, what’s wrong?!” Panic was not a word Frederick would normally associate with himself, but Robin looked so small, and so  _hurt_  as he sat there on their couch, wrapped up in that awful pink Snuggie Anna had given him for his last birthday. There were candles  _everywhere_ ; on the floor, on the coffee table, on Robin’s tray-table, at the foot of the couch…everywhere.

“Oh! Welcome home, Frederick!” as if a switch had been flipped Robin half-jumped, half-rolled over the back of the couch to land as close to Frederick as possible, and Frederick tasted chocolate all over his lips. The Snuggie was quickly shrugged out of and thrown carelessly close to a few candles, but Robin’s cheery voice held Frederick’s attention. “I meant to have this all cleaned up before you got home.”

“Robin? What in the gods’ good name is going on here?” To say Frederick was confused was an understatement.

“Oh, this?”

“Yes, this!”

“…”

“Robin, if I’ve done anything,  _anything_  to upset you, please, tell me wh—

Robin laughed, actually laughed in spite of how choked and gross it sounded—not that Frederick would ever say such a thing—and once again Frederick felt chocolate on his teeth, on his tongue. “I’m not upset with  _you_ , Frederick. It’s just…” Robin trailed off, and Frederick didn’t know if he was supposed to be pushing for an answer.

“Just…what?”

“You know how I’m supposed to be writing a research paper with another student?”

Frederick nodded. He could vaguely remember Robin telling him something similar at the beginning of the semester.

“Well, the guy I’m working with is a complete ass-hat. I had to go out and collect  _thirty_  more sample questionnaires because he didn’t do his share!”

“And that explains the sad music because…?”

“Because I just needed to vent and Mariah Carey is my spirit animal—you  _know_  that—and also because I thought it might help me feel like I still have some control over  _my_  research. Because let’s face it, the ass-hat isn’t going to help me with anything.”

Frederick couldn’t say that he knew what he could do for Robin in that situation. He was still in the process of wrapping his head around what he had seen, truth be told, and Robin seemed to understand that well enough. As Frederick stood there, staring mostly at the ground, the blond man flicked on the lights and set about blowing out all the candles.

“Wait, let me help you.” The sight of Robin bent over a small collection of flames startled Frederick into movement. Robin and fire, as evidenced by every campfire or bonfire they had ever sat beside, were not a good mix…or perhaps that was only when  _he_ got involved, as Robin held up a hand and hastened to blow out every last candle. Once he’d finished he crawled back into his Snuggie, shaking into the thing as if it were just an ordinary house-robe.

“Aren’t you going to get dressed, Fred?”

Frederick looked down at himself; vest, tie, plain white collared shirt, slacks…yeah; changing would be a good option. “You’re sure you’re alright?”

“Of course,” Robin said, smiling through the chocolate in his mouth.

“Stop eating those, okay? I’m going to be starting on dinner soon.”

“Sure.”

 

 

 

Predictably, Robin did  _not_  stop eating chocolate and singing Mariah Carey under his breath all while Frederick changed, something that Frederick figured out while serving dinner.

 

 

 

***

 

 

 

Frederick knew it was rare that he was able to cut loose and listen to the music he loved without fear of teasing, so an empty house and some scheduled light cleaning was as good a time as any for a little fun. Or so he thought, anyway, and it wasn’t as if he would be remiss in his duties to both vacuum and dust the entire main floor, starting with the perpetually messy living room.

Grabbing his phone and putting on his “Endless Cleaning” playlist, Frederick grinned. No need to perform his chores in silence.

He hadn’t expected to hit this particular song so early in his shuffled playlist but as soon as the first notes hit his ears he pulled his phone free from his pocket, adjusted the settings until the volume was high enough to drown out the whirring of the vacuum, jabbed at the screen impatiently until the song was set on a loop, and then he was ready.

 

[“Oh! I’m overdue](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Rg3sAb8Id8)

Give me some room

I’m comin’ through”

 

Frederick would admit it to  _nobody_ —not without more alcohol than he was sure would kill him first—but  _by the gods,_ he loved this song. Just. Everything about it. The way it flowed. The pulsing beat. Everything about it was  _perfect_.

So perfect, in fact, that he had no idea what he was doing as the song played over and over and carried him off into a world all his own. Frederick allowed the beat to take full control, trusting his body to follow along. So enraptured was he in the song that the vacuum, still on and laying flat on the carpet underneath the coffee table, was all but forgotten as he moved in time to the beat.

 

“Sweatin’ ‘til my clothes come off!”

 

_Pump, pump, pump, pump. Shake, shake, shake. Hit, hit, hit, hit, ha!_

It felt  _good_  to just let go like this, to just let the music flow into him and whip him around like a puppet being handled by a masterful, inventive puppeteer. Choreography he had known by heart since his late childhood returned to him bit by bit, and without realizing it Frederick pushed aside the couch and the armchairs in a bid to make more room.

“It’s about time that I came to start the…” he half-sang, half-spoke into his feather duster, not even focused enough to really finish the line before he was back at his pumping and thrusting and shimmy-shaking.

And then the sound of familiar, barking feminine laughter and very loud,  _distinctly familiar_  clapping caught his attention, and Frederick would have sworn if he wasn’t still stuck halfway through the dance. He almost didn’t want to turn to face his audience, but avoiding them would have done nothing.

“And you said  _I_  had strange music habits…what do you call this, Freddie?”

They’d already seen him, after all.

Seen him dancing around in his most casual t-shirt and shorts.

Seen him pumping his arms back and forth like a girl in a rap video.

Seen him shaking his buttocks and grinding on imaginary backup dancers while completely ignoring the vacuum cleaner that was still on.

With a feather duster— _the_  feather duster, he realized with some horror—in his hand.

 

With a gulp, Frederick turned towards the group at the door, appalled to find that it was not only Anna and Aversa who had seen him, but his boyfriend and his boyfriend’s twin sister as well…his whole household. For a moment nobody spoke, and Frederick was able to take in Robin’s blush, and the way Raina’s entire body seemed frozen, strained with the valiant effort of holding in her laughter for his sake.

His gratitude towards her quickly died out when she said, shaking from the effort of speaking in a fairly controlled voice, “Somebody,  _please_  tell me you got some of that.”

Much to his horror Anna held up her phone, grinning wickedly. “Got you covered, Doc.”

“ _Nurse,_ Anna, fuck. But good. That shit is  _golden._ ”

Never had Frederick wanted to be struck down by a god he didn’t necessarily believe in until this very moment. He would have let himself be smote down by anybody, anybody at all, rather than have to suffer through a single second more of this. Not even Robin, usually his only ally in the house on the best of days, could do more than offer a sympathetic smile.

 

At least they still weren’t sure exactly which song was blaring in his ears.

 

Until, of course, Anna practically  _teleported_  to his side. Gods, he hated how she seemed to be able to do that  _all the time._ And especially in cases like this, where all he wanted was a wide berth. In his haste to back away, Frederick’s earphones caught on to something, some stupid little thing on Anna’s purse, and then the sound of Christina Aguilera’s voice flooded the air. Not one to blush under normal circumstances, Frederick could feel the colour rising to his cheeks, spreading down his neck and all over his body as his boyfriend and friends all squealed.

 

“OH!”

“MY!”

“GODS!”

“DIRRTY?! REALLY?!”

“I  _knew_  those moves looked familiar!”

 

Frederick looked at the vacuum that nobody had bothered to pick up or turn off. He looked at the feather duster in his hands. Reluctantly, he looked each and every one of his housemates in the eye. Had they always seemed that small? That far away from him? Frederick squared his shoulders first, then his jaw, and took in a deep, measured breath. There was only one way open to him to curb the mounting humiliation.

 

In the sternest, yet most simultaneously casual voice he could muster, he said, “Don’t any of  _you_  ever just burst into song?”

 

The laughter stopped, and Frederick almost ( _almost_ ) pumped both of his fists in victory, proud of himself for having averted a veritable domestic crisis. Until Anna stepped right up to him, eyes gleaming with their usual cheeky charm, but somehow so far below his own. Had she been that much shorter than him this morning?

 

“Oh, we’ve  _all_  been there, Fred. It’s just, none of  _us_  have ever spent a good three or four minutes standing on top of the couch and humping the air like a desperate teenager at a Drake concert.”

Frederick looked down, and sure enough, he had danced himself onto the couch.

“…My…well this has been mortifying.”

“Even more mortifying than the feather duster thing?” Raina piped up.

 Frederick looked at her.

 

 

 

“Now…that, I don’t know.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> This went from a short thing to a 24 page...thing. I have no clue how.
> 
> Anyway, check out the first part in the series by my friend [ WindStainedDreams ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WindStainedDreams/pseuds/WindStainedDreams) for more of these losers. Let us know what you think!
> 
> AND IF ANYBODY FEELS THE NEED TO MAKE SOME SORT OF ART FOR THIS/ANY OF OUR OTHER FIC (between us there's quite a lot) FEEL FREE TO PLEASE [ CONTACT ME ](https://lazywritergirl.tumblr.com) because we would love to see it, and only lack of artistic talent stops us from doing it ourselves.


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